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GEORGE HOWELL, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): A rare moment of hope in Syria. A cease-fire set to start right now in parts of the country's southwest.

Plus, a club of one. The U.S. president, Donald Trump, approaches issues such as climate change and global trade, drawing criticism from others.

And a boost for Venezuela's embattled opposition. Dissident leader Leopoldo Lopez is moved from prison to house arrest.

Live from CNN World Headquarters in Atlanta, we want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. I'm George Howell. The CNN NEWSROOM starts right now.

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HOWELL: It is 5:00 am on the U.S. East Coast, noon in Damascus, Syria, this hour, where a cease-fire is set to start in parts of Syria right now. This the result of a deal that was reached by the U.S. president Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

This happened on the sidelines of the G20 summit Friday in Hamburg, Germany. Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said the two countries promised to ensure that all sides comply with the cease- fire.

Following this story, CNN's Jomana Karadsheh is live in Amman, Jordan.

So first of all, we know that it's taking effect right now, Jomana.

What does this mean for people there on the ground?

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think we have to wait and see; everyone is waiting to see how different this is and if it is any different to previous cease-fires we have seen in the Syrian conflict.

You've had cease-fires come and go. And sometimes Syrians would tell you that the violence that comes after a cease-fire is much worse than the one that preceded it.

So everyone is going to see if that means that guns are going to fall silent. This is a part of the country where violence has been raging in recent months. We've seen a regime offensive in that province with its border with Jordan, where regime forces and allied militias have been advancing, taking territory from the Free Syrian Army rebels in that part of the country.

And just to put this into context, George, this agreement, this cease- fire that is meant to go into effect right now, is a product of an agreement between Russia, Jordan and the United States.

They have been working on this for a few months of behind closed doors, negotiations to reach a deescalation zone agreement, whereby they create this deescalation zone in Southwestern Syria.

And the first key part of this agreement will be a cease-fire that has just begun. At noon local time that will set this, create this environment where they can go forward and create the deescalation zone.

Now there are a few critical issues that they still need to agree on, still need to iron out, as we've heard from U.S. and Jordanian officials; that is the enforcement mechanism and the monitoring of this cease-fire and how that is going to happen.

Perhaps, according to a U.S. official, that we will see some sort of a monitoring force on the ground, agreeing on that force is going to still be a lot of work ahead for those involved in these negotiations.

And this is a part of the country where it is not just regime forces and rebels. You've got different parties, different groups. And while the United States, Jordan and Russia have a great amount of influence when it comes to key players in that part of the conflict, there still are others that are not signatories to this deal, including extremist groups like an ISIS affiliate that operates in that border region between Jordan, Syria and Israel.

So there are possibilities for so much going wrong still. We have to wait and see what happens in the coming hours, George. Of course, usually it's not just about a cease-fire going into effect, it's a cease-fire holding that's going to be critical.

HOWELL: Jomana, so we have yet to see how this plays out. Those are the geopolitics behind the cease-fire.

But just from your reporting, your experience covering this, we do know what it's like for people living in that situation, the hell that they undergo each and every day.

Just help our viewers to understand what it's like for life, for many of these people in this part of the world.

KARADSHEH: Well, you have people who are trapped in this conflict for years now. They are living under constant bombardment. And when you see advances like, you know, the regime offensive that is

going on right now, that means heavy fighting where people are trapped, civilians, children, who are at times the victims of the violence, whether it's the indiscriminate barrel bombs, the airstrikes, the crossfire when you have different groups fighting around civilian areas.

And also another critical part of this, George, is humanitarian aid. You know --

And I do remember about a year ago, speaking to a Syrian rebel from that part of the country. And I asked him, what was it that people needed the most, when you're talking about humanitarian aid.

And he said it is something so basic as infant formula and diapers for children, that they cannot find and that they really need.

So it just gives you a glimpse into how difficult life is for people who are trapped in this conflict, with no end in sight really.

And, of course, there is a bit of cautious optimism today that this cease-fire may be the start of something. But, again, there's also a lot of skepticism in Syria, as people have seen these cease-fires come and go in the past.

HOWELL: Cautious optimism. It's 12:05 in that part of the word. A cease-fire just taking effect, for our viewers who are joining us here in the U.S. and around the world, a cease-fire taking effect in the southwest part of Syria. Jomana Karadsheh live, thank you for the reporting.

Let's get some analysis now from Justin Bronk. He is a research fellow in military science at the Royal United Services Institute, live with us in our London bureau this hour.

It's good to have you with us, Justin. Let's talk about this cease- fire.

With regard to the full picture of Syria, given the complexity of the many different conflicts in that country, different regions require different things, does this make a major difference?

JUSTIN BRONK, ROYAL UNITED SERVICES INSTITUTE: Well, I think this will make a major difference, particularly for Jordan, given the extreme problems they have with, you know, housing very large numbers of refugees and with ensuring border security.

And it's certainly, I think, useful for Donald Trump domestically, to be able to say that he's brokered some sort of cease-fire. But as you mentioned it, this is Southwest Syria. There's a lot of fighting going on elsewhere in the country. And, you know, the compliance or otherwise with the Syrian regime as well as, you know, the various extremist forces, which also operate in the region, as was mentioned, will be critical to seeing how much difference this actually makes on the ground.

I think, geopolitically, this should be seen rightly as a victory for Russia because the fact that this is an agreement between the U.S. and Russia specifically, in effect, legitimizes a lot of the gains which the Syrian regime has made since the Russian intervention a few years ago, during which time they have pushed back what have been known as the sort of moderate rebel forces from large parts of Syria.

So having a cease-fire deal, if it holds, particularly between the U.S. and Russia, which includes a lot of those gains, I think should be seen as a win for Vladimir Putin.

HOWELL: And Russia even making the point that Russian officials there on the ground, that they will be supervising in concert with American and Jordanian forces there on the ground. So obviously, as you point out, this is a very important distinction for Russia in this agreement.

But let's talk about the humanitarian situation there. I just spoke with our correspondent, Jomana Karadsheh, about this. We've been covering it for so long now. And we just talk about the many lives and many people who are caught in the middle of this.

What is the humanitarian situation like right now for people there?

BRONK: The humanitarian situation in large parts of Syria is almost unrecognizable in terms of its desperate nature, compared to almost anywhere else in the world.

Even Iraq, for example, where there's a large amount of fighting in various parts, you don't see anything like the same destruction in terms of infrastructure, roads, hospitals, schools, all of this stuff.

So any opportunity to get more aid in to those affected communities in this part of Southwestern Syria will have a huge impact on people's lives there, particularly given the roads are heavily mined, in many cases, and also very badly damaged.

The ability for aid groups, for example, to fly in to a particularly isolated destroyed communities by helicopter, which previously was very, very difficult, not to say impossible under most circumstances because of the threat to those aircraft, this is part of the country which is contested between Syrian regime forces, which have access to air defense equipment, as well as U.S.-backed forces.

So the ability to operate helicopters and things, to bring in aid to communities that can't easily be reached on the ground without fear of those being shot down, will hopefully make a big difference to people on the ground.

HOWELL: That will be interesting to see.

But here is one other question to you, because we've covered so many cease-fires in Syria.

What makes this one different than others?

BRONK: I think what makes this one different is that it's brokered between the U.S. and Russia directly and it doesn't actually nominally involve the Syrian regime.

So rather than cease-fires which we've seen between, in effect, the Syrian regime and rebel forces, particularly around besieged cities, which usually are part of some sort of evacuation or surrender deal to give people safe --

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BRONK: -- passage out of areas, this is potentially one which can be more enforced by the international community on both sides from the get-go.

The issue is, of course, that the U.S. and Russia have very different strategic aims in Syria. And, as has been previously mentioned, there actually are limited means by which the international community can enforce the cease-fire, if various rebel groups and extremist groups or, indeed, the Syrian regime choose to try and make gains without putting ground troops in, which is something I think both sides are loathe to escalate their involvement already in Syria, it's going to be quite difficult to enforce that cease-fire if sides start to break it.

HOWELL: Justin Bronk, thank you so much for your insight, again, this cease-fire just took effect. We're 10 minutes into it. We appreciate your analysis today. Thank you.

The U.S. president, Donald Trump, is back in Washington, D.C., after the G20 summit. Earlier, he called his meeting with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, "tremendous."

And we're also hearing from Mr. Putin himself. We get more now from our international diplomatic editor, Nic Robertson.

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NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: On that contentious issue of what was it that was said between President Trump and President Putin, President Putin, in his press conference, said that he thinks that President Trump accepted his answer. But he said you would have to actually ask him.

But what was fascinating was the importance that President Putin put in the cease-fire that he said the United States gives support for in the southwest part of Syria. He seemed to think this was a big deal, that it had was overlooked.

But he also had another headline in his press conference there that he feels that the United States is taking a much more pragmatic approach in Syria to the point of being willing to pool resources -- that's what he said, "pool resources" in Syria. That perhaps stronger language than we heard from Secretary of State

Tillerson when he was describing how the meeting had gone between the two presidents on Saturday.

But for Putin's point of view, clearly feeling in the driving seat on Syria, clearly feeling that he now has buy-in, at least from the United States, from President Trump, who he said, by the way, was a different person behind closed doors than what you may see in public.

But it was left to Angela Merkel here to really sort of sum up what was achieved at the G20 in the final communique on trade. She was very clear that it was a fight against protectionism and a fight against unfair trade.

Now that is something that she has conceived in advance of this summit, as the United States really being against free trade and more for protectionism. So this leaves the United States something as an outlier on that; on globalization, too, she's been very clear.

She feels that the United States on globalization is sort of out of step, that it would rather see winners and losers, that it's OK for the bosses to profit. But she's always talked about a win-win situation.

So on globalization, she was clear, they've agreed that everyone should benefit from globalization.

On steel, a big concern going into this summit that, on steel, there could be tariffs or quotas imposed by the United States. This could lead to a trade war, a global trade war. And that seems to have been headed off.

There's going to be a commission that will look at the global steel trade. That will report in November. So that issue seems to be headed off.

But she had the biggest criticism for President Trump and the United States on the issue of climate change. She said it was deplorable that the United States appears to be pulling out of the Paris climate change accord. That was her strongest language.

So at the end of the G20, it leaves Angela Merkel very much a sort of a central figure here and the United States' President Trump, for the first time in many, many years, looking as something of an outlier, not agreeing with so many of the other nations on some of the big issues -- trade and climate change -- Nic Robertson, CNN, Hamburg, Germany.

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HOWELL: Nic, thanks.

President Trump has not spoken out himself about the differing accounts of his meeting with President Putin and whether he accepted the Russian's denial of any meddling in the 2016 U.S. election. But his Treasury Secretary did respond to a reporter aboard Air Force One with this ... answer?

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A president of another country making a statement about the President of the United States.

Do you not want to respond to that and correct the record, if it is wrong?

STEVEN MNUCHIN, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: I'm not going to make comments about what other people say. President Trump will be happy to make statements himself about that. But President Trump handled himself brilliantly. It was very clear he made his position felt. And after very substantive dialogue on this, they agreed to move on to other discussions.

And I think it's very clear that they've opened a dialogue, that it's important to have a dialogue --

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MNUCHIN: -- as we've said, they focused on a cease-fire on Syria, focused on making sure that we have a cyber unit to make sure that Russia and nobody else interferes in any democratic elections.

And we focus on the issue of North Korea, which is a major concern to us and all our other allies.

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HOWELL: The U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Nikki Haley, is also talking about President Trump's insistence that Moscow did not interfere in last year's election. She told CNN's Dana Bash that Russia is trying to cause chaos through such hacking. But she also defended President Trump's response to the Russian leader -- listen.

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NIKKI HALEY, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N.: I think President Putin did exactly what we thought he would do, which is deny it. So this is Russia trying to save face. And they can't. They can't. Everybody knows that Russia meddled in our elections.

DANA BASH, CNN SR. U.S. CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Why won't the president say this in public?

It would put a lot of these questions -- and, frankly, the fact that a lot of your fellow Republicans are perplexed, it would put it all to rest.

Why won't he do it?

HALEY: I think that you can ask him. Everybody's trying to nitpick what he says and what he doesn't. But talk is one thing, actions are another. He confronted President Putin. He made it the first thing that he talked about and we have to now see where it goes from here. (END VIDEO CLIP)

HOWELL: You can hear more of Ambassador Haley's interview on "STATE OF THE UNION." That is just in four hours' time from right now.

The U.S. president's top diplomat is presently in Ukraine. This is Rex Tillerson's first official visit to that country. He's set to meet with the president there, Petro Poroshenko, soon. The State Department says Mr. Tillerson intends to reaffirm America's commitment to Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Our senior international correspondent Ivan Watson is live for us in Moscow following this.

And, Ivan, what can we expect from this meeting?

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, just two days ago, Rex Tillerson was in a lengthy one-on-one meeting with President Trump and President Putin and Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister.

And now he is in the Ukrainian capital and he's about to sit down with Petro Poroshenko, the Ukrainian president. Now this is significant, because Ukraine views itself to be effectively at war with its eastern neighbor, Russia, ever since the invasion, occupation and annexation of the Ukrainian Peninsula of Crimea in 2014.

And Ukraine has been at war with Russian-backed separatists now for several years, in the east of Ukraine, in a conflict that has claimed more than 10,000 lives and left countless more homeless.

So it's going to be important from the Ukrainian perspective, to be reassured that a warming of ties between the leader of its archenemy and the U.S. that does not mean that Ukraine will be left out in the cold, that its interests will be ignored.

And the Ukrainians have made a point of pointing out that President Poroshenko was in Washington on June 20th and did have a face-to-face meeting with President Trump ahead of this much-anticipated and historic meeting with President Putin in Hamburg.

Now coming out of the Putin-Trump meeting, the U.S. administration announced that it was appointing a special envoy to deal with the Ukrainian crisis and that is a former U.S. ambassador to NATO named Kurt Volker. And he is accompanying Tillerson on this visit to Kiev, which will only actually last a few hours -- George.

HOWELL: Ivan, I'm curious to ask you, what has been the response there in Russia?

In Russian media, with regard to the G20 summit, this meeting between these two presidents.

And also, what are we hearing from President Putin himself about meeting President Donald Trump? WATSON: Well, I think the Russians were delighted by this meeting. You had seen senior lawmakers calling it a breakthrough. Russian state media arguing that the face-to-face meeting between Trump and Putin eclipsed the entire G20.

And President Putin himself looked pretty pleased when he gave his lengthy press conference in front of cameras on Saturday, in front of the international media. And he heralded this meeting as well.

You haven't had a U.S. and Russian president meet face-to-face in nearly two years. And President Trump -- Putin, rather -- when speaking to journalists, he shared some unusual observations about what he thought of his American counterpart, take a listen.

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VLADIMIR PUTIN, PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA (through translator): TV Trump is very different from the real president. He's absolutely specific, absolutely adequate in his perception of the dialogue partner. He analyzes things quickly, replies to the --

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PUTIN (through translator): -- raised questions or new elements in the conversation.

So I think if our future relations will unfold the same way as our meeting yesterday, there is every reason to believe that we can restore, at least partially, the level of cooperation we need.

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WATSON: So while there's a sense that this has been a step forward, there is also the understanding that the U.S. has not lifted sanctions that were imposed over the Crimea annexation and, more recently, over accusations that Russia meddled in the 2016 U.S. elections. Those are not being raised at this point.

And there is also the knowledge and understanding that, in Washington, much of the governing establishment is very suspicious about Russia and opposed to expanding relations between Washington and Moscow -- George.

Celebrations on the streets of Caracas. Coming up, what the release of the opposition leader, Leopoldo Lopez, might mean for the ongoing turmoil that's taking place in Venezuela.

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HOWELL: Welcome back to NEWSROOM.

We've been following the economic and political unrest in Venezuela and it's actually triggered angry protests in Spain. Take a look.

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HOWELL (voice-over): In Madrid, thousands of people gathered to show their anger against the Venezuelan president, Nicolas Maduro. The protests come after Venezuela's best-known dissident, Leopoldo Lopez, was released from prison and granted house arrest for leading anti- government protests.

President Maduro says that he hopes the Lopez decision will provide a basis for reconciliation.

International pressure is believed to be one of the reasons for the release of Lopez. That country is in economic and political turmoil, with a rising death toll from 100 days of anti-Maduro protests. Our Leyla Santiago has more.

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LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Leopoldo Lopez is back home, celebrating freedom from prison even though he remains on house arrest.

The former mayor and presidential candidate spent 3.5 years in a military prison after he was charged with inciting violence, conspiracy and arson during the 2014 anti-government protests. He denied the accusations but Venezuelan --

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SANTIAGO (voice-over): -- president Nicolas Maduro says Lopez must pay for his crimes.

NICOLAS MADURO, PRESIDENT OF VENEZUELA (through translator): The responsible people must pay before the court of law. And they will pay before the court of law.

SANTIAGO (voice-over): Nearly a year before his imprisonment, Lopez warned against collapse and economic consequences.

LEOPOLDO LOPEZ, FORMER VENEZUELAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Venezuela, over these years, has become an economy addicted to imports. What we eat, what we dress, everything that we use comes from other countries. And, of course, that has had a consequence.

SANTIAGO (voice-over): In March of this year, protests ramped up when Venezuela's pro-government supreme court announced they were taking over legislative powers from the national assembly, a decision that was short-lived.

But protests continued. Acts of defiance symbolized frustration over food and medicine shortages, a collapsed economy, a growing political divide. As violence escalates on the streets, a daring attack on the supreme court and clashes between Maduro loyalists and opposition leaders at the National Assembly on Venezuela's independence day.

This weekend, through a statement, Lopez says, "Venezuela, this is a step toward freedom. If continuing my fight for freedom means going back to Ramo Verde, I am ready to do it."

Venezuela's government says the move to home detention of Leopoldo Lopez is proof that rule of law still stands, as Lopez shows the world he is still standing, too -- from the Venezuela-Colombia border, Leyla Santiago, CNN.

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HOWELL: Leyla, thank you for the report.

Still ahead here on NEWSROOM, it was their first face-to-face meeting. What the White House is saying about President Trump's meeting with President Putin.

Plus, in Chicago, police are working with new tools to tackle the gun violence issues plaguing that city.

We are live from Atlanta, Georgia, this hour. To our viewers in the United States and around the world, this is CNN NEWSROOM.

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HOWELL (voice-over): It's 5:30 am on the U.S. East Coast. We want to welcome our viewers back here in the United States and all around the world. You are watching CNN NEWSROOM and it is good to have you with us. I am George Howell with the headlines.

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HOWELL: Now more on the G20 summit that happened. It was the first opportunity for President Trump and Putin to meet face-to-face. But the White House and the Kremlin have very differing versions of what was actually said in that meeting, as Athena Jones reports.

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ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Much of the focus leading up to the G20 summit and afterwards has been on the first face-to-face meeting between President Trump and Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, and the competing and contradictory readouts from the two sides about just what was discussed.

We know the meeting lasted a long time, 2:15 or so. We also know that both sides agreed that President Trump brought up the issue of Russian meddling in last year's election early in the meeting.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that the pair had a very robust and lengthy exchange on the subject. But here's where the readouts diverge. According to the Russians,

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov and President Putin himself, they say that President Trump took Putin at his word when he denied any Russian involvement or Russian meddling in last year's election.

A senior administration official told my colleague, Jim Acosta, Friday night that that is not how it went down.

But given the opportunity multiple times to correct the record during a briefing with reporters aboard Air Force One on the flight home, administration officials declined to do so. Here's an exchange with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. Take a listen.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A president of another country making a statement about the President of the United States.

Do you not want to respond to that and correct the record, if it is wrong?

STEVEN MNUCHIN, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: I'm not going to make comments about what other people say. President Trump will be happy to make statements himself about that. But President Trump handled himself brilliantly. It was very clear he made his position felt. And after very substantive dialogue on this, they agreed to move on to other discussions.

And I think it's very clear that they've opened a dialogue, that it's important to have a dialogue; as we've said, they focused on a cease- fire on Syria, focused on making sure that we have a cyber unit to make sure that Russia and nobody else interferes in any democratic elections.

And we focus on the issue of North Korea, which is a major concern to us and all our other allies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JONES: Now you heard Secretary Mnuchin there, dodging that question. You also heard him say that President Trump will be happy to make statements himself about this issue.

But, of course, the president did not make such a statement before leaving Europe. He did not hold a customary press conference, that presidents have held at every G20 summit in the last several years.

The last time we heard directly from the president on this issue of Russian meddling was in Poland on Thursday, when he gave a not very definitive statement about his belief on that issue.

He said he thought Russia could be involved but also other people and other countries, not the kind of definitive statement that many people want to hear from President Trump.

[05:35:00] HOWELL: Athena Jones, thank you so much for that report.

Mr. Trump's other anticipated meeting at the summit was the president of China, Xi Jinping. The two leaders discussed how to handle Kim Jong-un's nuclear program. China and the United States haven't always been on the same page when dealing with North Korea.

But after the meeting, Mr. Trump tweeted this, "Leaving Hamburg for Washington, D.C., and the White House. Just left China's President Xi, where we had an excellent meeting on trade and North Korea."

For more on Mr. Trump at the G20 summit, I'm joined now by Inderjeet Parmar in London. He is a professor of international politics at City University of London.

It's good to have you with us this hour. So we were just talking here about this meeting between President Xi and President Trump.

Given the issues that are on the table from Taiwan to the South China Sea and also the issue that is at the forefront, North Korea, was this a major gain for the U.S. and China?

INDERJEET PARMAR, CITY UNIVERSITY LONDON: Well, we don't really know the content of that meeting just now. But I would say that probably was not a major step forward in any substantive way because there were some meetings between President Xi and President Putin earlier in the week before the G20 summit, which suggested that Russia and China were much more unified on their approach to the North Korean question and were actually opposed to the escalation of the situation, which the United States is in favor of.

HOWELL: I want you to consider what happened between the meeting with President Trump and President Putin. We'll never know exactly what was said between these two world leaders.

But with regard to the issue of Russian meddling in the U.S. election, the Russians are saying that President Trump agreed to President Putin's denial very clearly. Listen here to the Russian foreign minister. We'll talk about it on the other side.

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SERGEY LAVROV, RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): President Trump said he heard Putin's very clear statements that this is not true and that the Russian government did not interfere in the elections and that he accepts these statements. That's it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOWELL: He says, "That's it."

So on the other side of the coin, U.S. officials not really being so clear, really giving non-answer answers or whatever you might make of that.

What do you make of it? PARMAR: Well, I think this issue about meddling in the election, to some extent, President Trump and President Putin are trying to put it to one side in order to open a dialogue. And I would think, in the bigger picture, probably, that's not a bad thing. It's better to have dialogue than not to have it.

But what I think it does do is deflect attention from some very important things. The world is at an inflection point. And I think there's a whole set of relationships which are being recalibrated and renegotiated.

And President Trump's intervention into this is often seen as very, very different, a real disruption or challenge to the established order.

But I've been reading recently what people used to say about President Ronald Reagan and also what people used to say about President George W. Bush. America first, unilateralism, militarism, sort of all take and no give.

And a lot of this now is being applied to President Trump as well. So what I would say is that, although there are some serious issues, there's also a kind of a new picture of the world emerging.

And President Trump's attempt to deal with that in a particular way, which is redefining some of the boundaries, and I don't think a lot of it is a major challenge to the world order but I think it is a different style.

And it's more hard power, much more economically focused, a lot of military power being promoted. And I think when we look at the Russian meddling and so on, we forget that President Trump had a meeting with the Three Seas Initiative countries as well and has said he's going to sell arms to them and cheaper liquid gas to them as well.

So that's strengthening a group of countries which are on the Russian border. He also said he supports Article 5 of the NATO charter, which again is another thing that President Putin would not have welcomed. So it's a kind of diplomacy but it's backed by mighty force as well, militarily and economically.

HOWELL: And it is important to also point out these two leaders, Trump and Putin, came together on a cease-fire that is taking effect presently in Southwestern Syria. So we will obviously continue to monitor the situation there.

HOWELL (voice-over): Police in Chicago are using some new tools to fight crime and get to crime scenes faster. Ahead, we look at whether they can make a difference in stopping that city's gun violence. Stay with us.

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HOWELL: Welcome back.

I remember covering violence on the streets of Chicago over the 4th of July holiday when I was a correspondent in that bureau. It is shocking.

And this year proved to be another bloody occasion for the city of Chicago. Police responded to more than 100 shootings. Local and federal law enforcement are now using new tools, though, to try to fight crime in that city. Our correspondent in Chicago, Ryan Young, has more for us.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On the campaign trail and in office, President Donald Trump says Chicago is a war zone, facing epidemic crime and violence.

TRUMP: What is going on in Chicago?

It's worse than some of the places that we read about in the Middle East.

YOUNG (voice-over): This year police say overall crime is down 14 percent in Chicago. But as the 4th of July holiday weekend proved, the city continues to face challenges.

Over 100 people were shot, with 15 killed over the extended five-day holiday weekend, the victims as young as 13 and as old as 60. Chicago police superintendent Eddie Johnson knows the fight is not an easy one.

EDDIE JOHNSON, CHICAGO POLICE SUPERINTENDENT: And if we could solve this issue in a week, we'd have done it. If you have somebody that can do that, well bring them forward and I'll be happy to listen to them.

YOUNG (voice-over): Not an easy task. In 2016, more than 700 people were killed and 4,300 people were shot, the highest total in 19 years. So far this year, Chicago has seen over 300 homicides. But that slight drop has not mean the city is escaping national attention.

JOHNSON: We know that earlier in the year we got a lot of attention from various tweets and this is what I would say to that. We've gotten 20 new agents assigned here for the ATF and we're thankful for that. But the simple fact of it is, we can use more.

YOUNG (voice-over): Not waiting for federal help, the city is investing heavily in new technology aimed --

[05:45:00]

YOUNG (voice-over): -- at outsmarting criminals.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a real-time situational awareness room.

YOUNG (voice-over): Specially computers log every crime that adjust to what's happening by the second, while using crime data from the last 10 years to help predict areas of concern. Each color on the screen gives officers a different warning or direction.

A network of 35,000 cameras watches over the city and sensors listen for gunshots the second they happen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you see here eight rounds were detected. We can play the audio to hear what those rounds actually sound like.

YOUNG (voice-over): The information helps speed up response times, sometimes helping police get to crime scenes before the first 9-1-1 call.

This year, crime is down by a third in the two neighborhoods where new technology has been installed, including Inglewood, one of the toughest.

But some of the daily violence over the 4th of July holiday weekend did happen in the neighborhoods with the new technology. We talked to a man who has lived in Inglewood for years and deals with that risk you (ph). His neighborhood is the epicenter of some of the violence.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's reactionary. You know, I hear more shot spotters on poles, blue lights flashing, German shepherds sniffing when we get on a train or something (INAUDIBLE), bulletproof glass is in front of us when we order in food, body cameras. I mean, all these things are reactionary.

YOUNG (voice-over): He would like to see the city and private investment support programs that are working at keeping at-risk youth away from gang life.

And the superintendent knows the new technology is not a complete answer to the problem.

HOWELL: CNN's Ryan Young reporting on the streets of Chicago, Illinois.

(WEATHER REPORT)

HOWELL: Still ahead here on NEWSROOM, one of the greatest mysteries. We have one more theory now to talk about with Amelia Earhart. Stay with us.

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[05:50:00]

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HOWELL: She was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, an aviation pioneer. But Amelia Earhart disappeared during an around-the-world trip about 80 years ago. Now historians and fans alike are hoping that a newly surfaced photo will help explain what happened to her. Martin Savidge has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is the image that has brought Amelia Earhart back to life.

SAVIDGE (on camera): Amelia Earhart?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's right.

SAVIDGE: The makers of a new History Channel documentary say the tall man on the right is Fred Noonan, Earhart's navigator. And in the center, sitting on the doc, none other than Earhart herself. Blurry, in the background, allegedly, Earhart's plane.

Could this single snapshot solve an 80-yeawr-old mystery?

SAVIDGE (on camera): In the 1930s, Amelia Earhart was a superstar. She was an aviation pioneer recognized around the world, a role model, who disappeared without a trace attempting the greatest triumph of her life.

SAVIDGE (voice-over): To become the first woman to circle the globe. She and Noonan were flying by way of the equator. And they'd made it three- fourths of the way when they disappeared July 2, 1937, over the Pacific.

Despite the largest search effort in U.S. history at the time, nothing was found.

DOROTHY COCHRANE, SMITHSONIAN AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM: We believe that she ditched into the Pacific Ocean.

SAVIDGE: This new photo was found in the National Archives and is said to be of an atoll in the Marshal Islands, but there's no date.

To some, it supports the controversial theory that Earhart and Noonan crashed and were taken prisoner by the Japanese. It was, after all, just before World War II. And that the pair were executed or died in prison.

Dorothy Cochrane, at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, is skeptical.

COCHRANE: We have no evidence of that. The Japanese government has said that it's untrue.

SAVIDGE (on camera): What do you think of this new photo that's been brought to life?

GILLESPIE: Not much.

[05:55:00]

GILLESPIE: I'm surprised it's gotten this much attention that it has.

SAVIDGE (voice-over): Rick Gillespie and his aviation group have been looking for Earhart since the 1980s. And they've made more than a dozen trips to the region. He believes she died as a castaway, not as a prisoner.

GILLESPIE: If this is a picture of Amelia Earhart in Japanese custody, where are the Japanese? There are no soldiers there. There's nobody in uniform. There's nobody with a weapon. There's nobody guarding anybody.

SAVIDGE: Still, both understand the buzz.

COCHRANE: It's fascinating when one of the most-famous people in the world simply disappears.

SAVIDGE: Though it might not solve aviation's greatest mystery, the photo does prove something -- 80 years later, Amelia Earhart, the pilot, the pioneer, the role model, is also still a superstar -- Martin Savidge, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOWELL: Martin, thank you.

A new Model 3 from Tesla just rolled off the assembly line. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has tweeted this image, saying, "First production Model 3."

The company has described this new version as the electric car for the masses. It is advertised as achieving 215 miles, that's 344 kilometers per charge, with a price tag starting around $35,000.

Thank you for being with us for this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm George Howell at the CNN Center in Atlanta. For our viewers around the world, our headlines are next. And for viewers in the United States, "NEW DAY" is back after the break. This is CNN, the world's news leader.